widespread

This term carries a neutral to negative weight, often appearing in reports about diseases, errors, or social unrest. It suggests a lack of containment, implying that a phenomenon has leaked or spread beyond a controllable center to infect a broad territory or population. While similar to pervasive, widespread focuses on the geographical or numerical extent of a thing. Pervasive suggests a deeper, more subtle infiltration into every part of a system, whereas widespread describes a broad surface-level distribution.